Date on Master's Thesis/Doctoral Dissertation

12-2011

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph. D.

Department (Legacy)

Department of Leadership, Foundations, and Human Resource Education

Committee Chair

Choi, Namok

Author's Keywords

Principal leadership; Psychological gender; Teacher perspectives; Elementary education

Subject

Elementary school principals--Attitudes; Educational leadership; Sex role in the work environment; Sex role--Psychological aspects

Abstract

Research has shown that various leadership styles have different impacts on leader outcomes such as satisfaction, extra effort, and effectiveness. Specifically, researchers have found that transformational leadership positively impacts follower perceptions of satisfaction, extra effort, and leader effectiveness (Avolio, Bass, & lung, 1995; Philbin, 1997; Yammarino, Spangler, & Bass, 1993). However, research has shown that not all leaders display transformational leadership. In fact, Eagly, Karau, & lohnson (1992) and their colleagues have shown transformational leadership in education to be linked to the extent to which male and female principals carry out their gender roles - referring to role congruity. Currently, not much is known empirically about the relationship between the role of the elementary school principal leadership and gender roles and its combined effects on teachers' perceived satisfaction, perceived effectiveness of their principals, and their assessment of extra effort put forth towards their job. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between leadership style (transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire) and psychological gender role group (masculine, feminine, undifferentiated, androgynous) of elementary school principals. Exploration of this topic filled a void in empirical investigations of the psychological gender perspective of school leadership. Multivariate Analysis of Variance techniques were used to examine the relationships between and among principal psychological gender role, biological gender, principal effectiveness, teacher satisfaction, and teacher extra effort. Additionally, canonical correlation was used to examine the relationship between leadership factor variable set and psychological gender role variable set. Results detected one relationship exists between psychological gender role and leadership behavior variable sets. Specifically, findings suggest femininity, masculinity, idealized influence attribute, idealized influence behavior, inspiration-motivation, intellection stimulation, individual consideration, contingent reward, and laissez-faire provide the best linear combinations of Pearson correlations between the leadership behavior and psychological gender role variable sets. In addition, results indicated statistically significant differences in perceived principal effectiveness, teacher perceived satisfaction, and teacher extra effort based on teacher perceived level of principal psychological gender. Teachers who perceived their principals as androgynous and feminine reported higher levels of extra effort, satisfaction, and principal effectiveness. Leadership behavior did not appear to have a significant influence on extra effort, satisfaction, and principal effectiveness. Additionally, the interaction effect between perceived principal psychological gender role group and principal biological gender was not statistically significant.

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